Assistant manager Andy Cooper asserts that The Spireites are nothing to fear from Town and says they will be fully prepared for the task of defeating the unbeaten leaders, Chesterfield.
Halifax enters the game riding a three-game winning streak, their most recent coming from a 2-1 home triumph over Woking on Saturday.
Chesterfield has been by far the best team in the National League this season and is currently 20 points ahead of second-place Bromley, whom they lost to on Saturday.
Cooper responded, “Lean on experiences we’ve had before when we’ve done it,” when asked whether Town could defeat them tomorrow night.
Teams with lengthy unbeaten streaks have visited this location in the past, and we have the ability to compete with anyone.
“It proves that anybody in the league can defeat anybody.” In a similar vein, we went into the away game with the belief that, despite a slow start, we could have won that evening.
“It’s about making sure we never stray from our fundamentals while playing against a team like that, fearlessly.
“We massively respect what they’re doing and Paul Cook and their staff for how they’ve had time to build and evolve a squad and a playing style but we went toe-to-toe with them at their place and we’ll be bang up for it for sure.”
The Shaymen don’t expect any of Town’s injured players to be in contention for Tuesday’s game with Chesterfield, although striker Rob Harker will return to full training this week.
Town looked dead on their feet towards the end of Saturday’s win against Woking, but will have few options to change things.
“It’ll be driven by the staff to make sure the lads have proper rest and recovery and we get all the time we can off their feet and make sure we manage the training load right and the preparation for Tuesday,” Cooper said.
“Make sure we’re fresh mentally as well.
“When you play the league leaders at home, there’ll be extra motivation there in terms of the magnitude of the game, everyone wants to be involved in the big games.
“We’ve had great success here and good days against teams that were flying in the league, last season with Wrexham, so in terms of motivation and trying to put our stamp on the rest of the season, we’ll be bang up for it.
“But it’s about how we recover and making sure we’re fully ready and prepared but we won’t treat it any differently to the normal Saturday-Tuesday turnaround, we just need to be mindful that we’re a number of weeks into it now and people are creaking, but that’s normal and every club has to deal with it.
“We respect the opposition, but our first priority is ourselves. We consider which team, which bench, and which strategy will help us win the game.
“It’s pretty obvious the lads have had such a heavy workload recently but they’ll be bang up for it and no doubt they’ll all be up for selection and want to play.”
On Saturday, The Shay pitch, which is set to host its third game in a week, appeared exhausted as well.
When asked if the surface will affect the game, Cooper responded, “It can be, but we just have to get on with it and make sure we prepare in the best way.”
“It’s a challenge we’ve faced before and it definitely won’t be any excuse, it’s up to us to make sure we get into the right frame of mind to try and take them on.”
Cooper does not believe that the game is a free hit.
“No, it’s another opportunity to get points on the board and stamp our mark on the season and keep going,” he replied.
In games, we are aware that we will have to endure hardships and that things won’t always go as planned.
“Last season when we played top of the league, we went 1-0 down early but the crowd rallied behind us and on that day, it was by no means a free hit, it was a really well executed tactical game-plan that we put together, that the lads bought into and delivered so there’s no reason why we feel we can’t do that again.”
